STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- "The Guitar" is one of those quiet, inward-looking indies, so little that it hurts, directed by a first-time filmmaker still finding her voice, that's destined to come and go without making a sound.

That's why we're here. Our expectations for this film could basically be summed up with that opening sentence, and while "The Guitar" is predictably all of that, the film also stayed with us for an entire weekend, the surest sign that it deserves a place in our permanent collection.

So, clearly, there's something here.

British model-turned-actress Saffron Burrows stars as Melody Wilder, a woman who never ventures above 14th Street and finds she's more alone than she ever imagined when she loses her job, is dumped by her boyfriend and is diagnosed with inoperable pharyngeal cancer all in one day (yes, that old cliche).

Melody reacts to her bad news by signing a short-term lease for a gorgeous loft apartment off Manhattan's West Street, where the film is content to reside for the bulk of its running time.

The apartment is empty to start, but Melody quickly begins spending like there's no tomorrow (because, you know, all her tomorrows were yesterday), filling the space with expensive furnishings, not the least of which is a red Fender Stratocaster guitar (with a stack of Marshall amps) that she's had her eye on since childhood.

The guitar is the realization of a lifelong dream, but also a symbol of a life begun anew when there's so little life left.

While everything we've just described has the potential to be as syrupy as all get-out, director Amy Redford (as in the daughter of Robert) exhibits just enough deftness to keep this material from becoming strictly that (for the most part).

The casting choice of Burrows is an initially curious one. As an actress, she's fully up to the task at hand, but the woman is achingly beautiful -- and Melody goes through a period where she decides to stop wearing clothes, which drives home this observation. Even when Redford tries to make Burrows look haggard, she's gorgeous.

But her casting is slyly successful, in the end, for who isn't going to sympathize with a beautiful woman who's been dealt a terrible hand?

As she holes up in her loft, refusing to go outside, Melody embarks on relationships (sexual, eventually) with the two people she does allow in her life -- the man who delivers her packages and the woman who comes with her pizza, played by Isaach de Bankole and Paz de la Huerta, respectively; still more instinctive casting.

The little three-ways that result are not exactly immune to cliche, either, although this sequence of the film does feature the best use of the David Bowie tune "John, I'm Only Dancing" we've ever encountered in a movie (as well as perhaps the only one).

The ending of "The Guitar" is utterly predictable so we might as well go there. Melody discovers in time that, indeed, all her tomorrows weren't yesterday, as the tumor disappears.

This puts her out on the street, given that she's built up debts so large it's doubtful that even the federal government could bail her out. But what's a leather sofa when you have your life back?

So, again with the cliches, but "The Guitar" is an immensely hopeful motion picture that overcomes its shortcomings with a lesson for us all. When Melody's flummoxed doctor (played by Janeane Garofalo, incidentally) asks her what she changed, she responds, "I changed everything."